Kind of funny to think about Kanpekis death then. "Father! We finally meet, I was emperor! Our dreams came true!" "I am so very disappointed in you"-D

I dunno. Daigotsu, at the end of the day, is all about results. Truthfully i never really got his interest in his son being pure in Goddesses part 4. i can only assume he saw it as an opportunity to get him into rokugani culture, but then we see the fiction above where he seems reluctant to grand Kanpeki the taint. Daigotsu never, EVER, demonstrated any kind of resentment about the taint. He administered the jade petal tea to kanpeki during the destroyer war because Kali Ma was controlling it. While Fu Leng was in charge, he gloried in his taint. When he was purified by Emma-O he concealed his purification and did everything he could to get that bit of his soul back so he could regain his connection to Jigoku. So being persnickety about his son embracing the taint, especially when he's in charge of it, kinda felt shitty to me, frankly. it wasn't one of my favorite moments. But lets put that aside, and fast forward to the inevitable time in the future after Kanpeki's onyx empire is over and the clans have killed him. He's down in Jigoku, having ruled Rokugan for a generation as his father foresaw. is big daddy D pissed that he didn't last up there? or proud that he did it at all? questioning his methods? i dunno.

Ultimately, what is Daigotsu's purpose in this bold new venture? What does he hope to accomplish in the creation of this Spider Clan? It is a gesture of respect for his god, the dark lord Fu Leng, that is true. It is likewise true that he wishes to incense the most righteous among the clans, driving them to fervor and misdirecting their wrath to straw men and sacrificial lambs. The entire endeavor is a plot to undermine and infiltrate the Great Clans to such an extend that it is possible for the Lost to finally seize control of the Empire of Rokugan. All of these things are true, and yet there is more: Daigotsu has a son. His son shall be the perfect union of Fu Leng's blessing and the Hantei bloodline. When he grows to be a man, he will be a warrior and a sorcerer the likes of which the world has never known. Daigotsu has vowed that his son will, upon the day of his gempukku, inherit an empire, and from that empire conquer the world. This much is certain. It has been foretold in a prophecy of blood, and nothing can avert it. Daigotsu has sworn that he shall be the herald of a new order, an order of darkness. There is no room for doubt.

(emphasis mine)

In fairness, Lotus was quite a few Brand/Story membership changes ago.

After all, Daigotsu's vow that his precious little nubbin would inherit an empire on the day of his gempukku didn't exactly pan out either, and I rather doubt anyone at the time of the writing planned on Fu Leng being dead by the time Kanpeki was grown man either...

Sounds like that might have been treated in retrospect as Big D's plans, rather than any sort of objective prophecy.

Also worth noting that at the time of that writing, the wider fanbase wasn't as utterly sick of Daigotsu's being the best at everything ever as they would later become, so handing even greater magic and fightyness to his offspring was almost certainly going to be a non-starter.

Looking back on things, I think 2 major events screwed up the story teams original plans for the Spider.

The first was the Spider "winning" the Celestial redemption storyline at the end of the Race for the Throne during Samurai. This likely held back any Spider integrating with the Empire plans they originally had for an entire arc.

The second was Spider winning the right to raise the Imperial Heir. This likely forced them to create a second Heir and the resolution of that story pushed back plans for Kanpeki's rebellion.

I dunno, I think the Heir business did more to hamstring the Progressive/Traditionalist thing than anything else...I think they already planned some sort of succession struggle, but by making Shibatsu the "Spider Candidate," they put the Progs in a rougher spot than they otherwise would have been...

In fairness, Lotus was quite a few Brand/Story membership changes ago.

After all, Daigotsu's vow that his precious little nubbin would inherit an empire on the day of his gempukku didn't exactly pan out either, and I rather doubt anyone at the time of the writing planned on Fu Leng being dead by the time Kanpeki was grown man either...

Sounds like that might have been treated in retrospect as Big D's plans, rather than any sort of objective prophecy....[/i]Also worth noting that at the time of that writing, the wider fanbase wasn't as utterly sick of Daigotsu's being the best at everything ever as they would later become, so handing even greater magic and fightyness to his offspring was almost certainly going to be a non-starter.

yeah, i think the Mary Sue Daigotsu thing definitely played a role in it, as did the evolution of the storyline. i think i'm less fussed about the prophecy in general than i am about the idea that they planned Kanpeki to be a shugenja and turned him into an MMA fighter.

Daigotsu Atsushi wrote:

Looking back on things, I think 2 major events screwed up the story teams original plans for the Spider.

The first was the Spider "winning" the Celestial redemption storyline at the end of the Race for the Throne during Samurai. This likely held back any Spider integrating with the Empire plans they originally had for an entire arc.

The second was Spider winning the right to raise the Imperial Heir. This likely forced them to create a second Heir and the resolution of that story pushed back plans for Kanpeki's rebellion.

i'm so torn on CE. when i think back, the destroyer war was such hot garbage. but it gave us some real great stuff. Shimekiri, Furumaro, and of course Goddesses part 4, which is divisive as fuck but is super my jam. but i agree that i think both of those are good examples of the strength of L5R, the interactive story, also being its weakness.

Shiba Gunichi wrote:

I dunno, I think the Heir business did more to hamstring the Progressive/Traditionalist thing than anything else...I think they already planned some sort of succession struggle, but by making Shibatsu the "Spider Candidate," they put the Progs in a rougher spot than they otherwise would have been...

a succession struggle seems like a very L5R kind of thing to do, so it wouldn't surprise me at all if thats exactly what the whole heir thing was a setup for regardless of who got to raise it, but i'm 100% with you that the spider doing so made the whole thing messier and kind of fucked up their plans.

The first was the Spider "winning" the Celestial redemption storyline at the end of the Race for the Throne during Samurai. This likely held back any Spider integrating with the Empire plans they originally had for an entire arc.

I am actually not familiar with this piece of the story of the Spider Clan. I know we were supposed to be eliminated by the Race to the Throne mega-game, as the Dragon victory meant the lowest Spirit faction was supposed to be eliminated. Did this happen afterwards?

The first was the Spider "winning" the Celestial redemption storyline at the end of the Race for the Throne during Samurai. This likely held back any Spider integrating with the Empire plans they originally had for an entire arc.

I am actually not familiar with this piece of the story of the Spider Clan. I know we were supposed to be eliminated by the Race to the Throne mega-game, as the Dragon victory meant the lowest Spirit faction was supposed to be eliminated. Did this happen afterwards?

"Eliminated" is a loaded word. The "prize" for losing the Race for the Throne was the loss of Great Clan status and a special "earn your redemption" storyline during Celestial. (something that a lot of players either forgot about or did not hear about) In many ways it was intended to be a popularity check for the losing Clan with failure to complete the redemption requirements during Celestial leading to the Clan being removed as a playable faction in Emperor edition and likely done this way to avoid the same sort of fallout that occurred when the Grosse's Gentleman faction was destroyed in 7th Sea.

This lead to a weird paradox when the Dragon won and the Spider had the lowest Spirit (behind the Mantis by about 2 points). The Spider were not yet a Great Clan but had just lost their Great Clan status. The situation could have been slightly different if the Mantis had not gotten a slight lead in Spirit over the Spider in the final weeks of the Race or if the Scorpion had won instead of the Dragon.

its hard to imagine a time, before Kalani's "go fuck yourself every other clan" Landing when mantis wasn't an environment deformingly popular clan. the game would have been an enormously different thing had we snuck past mantis. mantis wouldn't be a great clan and who knows if they'd have gotten it back. i would hazard to guess we'd still have lost Daigotsu one way or another, but i doubt the way we did. would there have been a goddesses part 4? a destroyer war depriving fu leng of his divinity? interesting to think about.

Hell, while we're at it... it was a Phoenix player that cemented the Spider winning the heir- the guy's two points (in whatever insane, opaque metric we were using at the time) wouldn't have meant squat to the Phoenix at that point, but he saw he could swing the heir with his choice, so he did so.

Got some Crane players hacked at him over it, actually...

Whoooooole lotta crazy around that arc and the unsatisfying megagame metrics. The timeskip, in particular, meant that unless your clan won an Heir, not much happened.

Total Failure in Glory: The Destroyer Horde stomps your face in!Total Failure in Honor: The plague ruins you!Total Success in Glory:You come out smelling like roses!Total Success in honor: What plague?

But SURPRISE, it's twenty years later so none of that actually matters!

The one thing I think the player base, the Design Team, the Story Team, and the Brand Team would all be able to agree on would be that, towards the end of the life of the CCG, there was TOO MUCH Story Interaction promised. Not necessarily too much Story Interaction, but definitely too much was promised.

It burned out the Story Team, made the player base angry and loud in the worst ways, frustrated the Design Team to no end, and made the Brand Team look alternatively like mismanaging idiots or manipulative, sneaky liars.

So, here is hoping that FFG learned from the mistakes of the end of the CCG in designing their LCG's interactive storyline and how it interacts with organized play.

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 1 guest

You cannot post new topics in this forumYou cannot reply to topics in this forumYou cannot edit your posts in this forumYou cannot delete your posts in this forumYou cannot post attachments in this forum